


A Study on the Habits of the Adult Obscurial

by Lindzzz



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Autistic!Newt, Credence gets rid of the stupid bowl cut, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Internalized Homophobia, It's Credence Barebone guys like Its Gonna Get Rough, M/M, Mentions of past abuse, Mutual Pining, Newt has no concept of personal space, POV Alternating, Panic Attacks, Pining, Religious Guilt, Self Harm, Slow Build, Touch-Starved, Two people who are bad at People learn how to feelings, Yea that's right we're getting into Credence Headspace so HEED THOSE TAGS
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-01
Updated: 2017-01-20
Packaged: 2018-09-03 13:04:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 16,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8715037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lindzzz/pseuds/Lindzzz
Summary: Newton Fido Artemis Scamander is possibly in over his head.Certainly, he is well accustomed to rescuing and working with frightened, hurt, and wildly dangerous things. It’s just that they’re almost never human.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Characters: *hardly interact until the end, don't even exactly exchange words, one got exploded into shards of shadow and may or may not be alive*
> 
> Me: Anyway so what if they fell in love though

He can feel it now, like he hadn't before. Like a churning, dark mass of all the anger and pain he had ever felt forced into one place.

The thought occurred to him, once he found himself able to stand on human legs again, to let it take over for good. Let it wipe him away in the black power of it. Credence could take the whole city down before the witches came for him. Burn it down around him and let it all end. 

But it seems so pointless now.

It simmers though, somewhere in him. A hissing burn like the singe of a brand on his palm. But the rest of Credence is numb as he steps into the only home he ever knew. 

It's spotless. The rafters unbroken. The bodies...gone. Chastity gone. His ma’....gone.

He thinks briefly about Modesty, about finding her. Running with her to get away from the world. But he saw her face before she ran crying from the wrecked house, when all he knew was waking up to death and crying and shattered wood around him. He now knows the look of horror on her face wasn't at her own power, but at his. At him.

He won't go find her. Little girls need to be protected from monsters.

They're all gone. Even the hope he had with the wizards. The promise of belonging torn away cruelly by Graves, and then snuffed for good by all the wizards and their burning wands. 

The darkness roils at the memory, but Credence can’t blame them for it, not really. Though part of him still wants to. It wants to make them suffer as much as he did, wants them to feel the pain they carved into him.

He wants them to look at him like he isn’t a terror from their nightmares.

He doesn't feel the tears coming until the cracked sound of his own voice breaks the silence. Credence sinks to the floor, crawls to the corner where he can feel the walls pushing against his human flesh.

His monster flesh. Perhaps ma’ had been right all along. And she tried and failed to cast the thing from him. He knows she never loved him, and while he still feels the sharp anger and resentment, it’s tempered now with an understanding.

A hesitant step creaks on the wood floor, and Credence curls tighter in on himself, letting the sobs that wrack his body remind him that he at least looks human. He can have that, at least. The dark twists in answer to his fear, but does no more than that as soft footsteps slowly approach him.

"Hello, Credence."

It is a gentle voice, and Credence looks up, vision blurred by tears. It’s the british wizard from the subway, the one who had been with the good witch at the end. The one Graves had attacked over and over while Credence could only run and cry in terror at what was happening until he let the dark take him over. 

The man is crouched a small distance away, blue coat buttoned up against the chill, arms resting on his bent knees and head tilted as he watches Credence closely.

"Are you here to kill me?" Credence asks, voice a rough croak. "You probably should, before it gets out again."

“No,” the man’s head ducks down as he shakes it, as if he’s trying to shake the very idea off of him, “Of course not. I'm no good with violence anyway.” He looks back up, still again. “Do you remember me, Credence? My name is Newt. Newt Scamander."

"From the subway." 

"That's right." Mr. Scamander’s lips twitch into an odd smile that's gone as soon as it's there, turning into a grimace. "Credence...I didn't...I am sorry. I didn't know the Auror's followed me. I never wanted you hurt. As far as anyone else knows, you're dead. I had a hunch otherwise, but I do think it's best if they keep thinking that."

His hands are more animated, moving in twitches and twists together, and he keeps his distance. Credence doesn't know if Mr. Scamander is lying or not, and at this point he doesn't care.

"You're frightened of me." Credence says firmly. He doesn't think he's ever heard such conviction in his own voice. Mr. Scamander only pauses, head tilting again as he eyes Credence.

"I'm not frightened of you." He says quietly. "But I am worried for you."

"You can't stand to come near me."

Mr. Scamander huffs, not quite a laugh or a sigh. "I've dealt with quite a few cornered, scared things in my life. I'm not going to just charge up on you and into your space. I'm not frightened, but I'm also not stupid."

"But you think I'm an animal." He doesn't know why he keeps talking, why he keeps pushing. He's exhausted and hurting and wants to curl up and let the cold take him, but he wants to prove some intangible point. Mr. Scamander only shrugs, mouth twisting in an odd smile like he's about to let Credence in on a private joke.

"All humans are animals, really. Very complicated, vicious beasts. But beasts all the same."

Ma’ used to say things like that, trembling in her holy rage and lip curled in disgust at it all. Mr. Scamander says it in his quiet voice like it isn't bad or good, but just is.

"What do you want?" Credence mutters, watching Mr. Scamander carefully while the dark rolls in him.

"I'm not just a wizard, you know." Mr. Scamander answers. "I just finished the manuscript for a book, you see. A guide on magical creatures from all over the world. Creatures that people are generally afraid of, but they're really just misunderstood because no one bothered to get to know them. And while I look forward to settling down a bit, I still find that there are some things I could use some assistance with as I continue my work.”

Mr. Scamander pauses then and watches Credence, who only stares back with wide eyes and trembling hands.

“I have a ship heading off in a few days.” Mr. Scamander goes on, softer and quieter now, blue eyes holding Credence's. “It’ll take me far away from here. You can come with me and I can help you, if you like. And I have a space where you can go if you feel it might get out again, so you won't hurt anyone. I meant what I said before, down in the tunnel. I knew a girl, just like you. She was frightened, alone, and her own magic was eating her away.”

The sincere worry in his eyes is searing, unwavering. Credence has to tears his own eyes away to stare at his hands clenching each other until the bones of his knuckles look as if they’ll break through his flesh.

“I couldn’t help her.” Mr. Scamander says, and not seeing the face is worse, because Credence hears the pain so clearly. “But I think I can help you.” 

Credence swallows, his heart pounds, and a voice inside screams LIAR to his core. But Credence is weak, and he still can't care if Mr. Scamander is another liar witch. His voice is gentle and kind, and Credence is starving for it, though he hates himself for that hunger. He doesn’t think he can be saved, but Christ in heaven does he want someone to try.

“What do I need to do in exchange?” He whispers, and Mr. Scamander frowns.

“Nothing. Just help out. Taking notes, caring for my collection. I’ll be doing anything dangerous. You may have to deal with me though. People aren’t used to dealing with me, and I often find the feeling mutual. But I’m sure I can manage.”

Mr. Scamander hesitates, rises from his crouch to close the distance with two long steps, and leans down with his hand extended to Credence. “Do you want to come?”

Away from here. Away from this city where there is nothing but pain and rejection. Freedom was already offered to him, held over his head like a carrot on a stick, and he is sure Mr. Scamander is lying to him too. But it doesn't matter, not when the lie looks like a dream. Not when Mr. Scamander only offers and watches him with his light, warm eyes.

With a shaking hand, Credence slowly reaches up to take Scamander’s.


	2. Chapter 2

Newton Fido Artemis Scamander may have gotten himself in over his head. Fortunately, he is very experienced with the feeling, and carries on regardless of how daunting his new charge may be.  
  
It really should not be so daunting. Newt is well accustomed to rescuing and working with scared, hurt, broken and wildly dangerous things. It’s just that...well... they’re almost never human.  
  
He tried to cure the little girl in Sudan, but for all that they suffer from the same parasite, Credence is an entirely different problem. He isn’t someone who can likely be _cured_ so much as _rehabilitated_.  
  
After his initial suspicion towards Newt, Credence seems to do a complete shift in the other direction. When Newt sets his suitcase down and climbs in with a "Follow me" there isn't a sound. Maybe there was a sharp inhale, but Newt wasn't listening for it, and Credence silently follows him after only a short pause.  
  
It’s almost disappointing, Newt had been quite pleased by the shout Jacob made. Different circumstances he supposes.  
  
“Watch your step, the billywigs can be an absolute nuisance, don’t let them startle you!”  
  
Credence stops on the ladder as silently as he came down, but his head does jerk up, and stay up until he gets to the bottom and notices Newt watching him.  
  
“Could you sit down please?” Newt asks, already whipping off his coat and rummaging through the shelves of his work room before Credence even turns and sinks down onto the stool.  
  
Newt feels a weight on him, a spine tingling pressure on the back of his neck, and he doesn’t need to turn around to know that he is being watched very intently. By the time he does turn, Credence’s eyes are fixed back on the floor, though Newt can see the twitches of his head as he glances around the room towards all the sounds outside the walls.  
  
“You’ve gone through a lot of magical stress,” Newt explains, twisting about to pluck a few leaves down from various plants around the workroom. Sure enough, those sharp pinpoints of pressure are back on him as soon as he’s turned around again. “Actually turning into an obscurus instead of just releasing it is rare, and is usually what kills the host. And lord knows what all those damned Auror’s threw at you. That’s Americans isn’t it? Blasting things right and left first, questions later. No offense.”  
  
No offense is apparently taken, because there is nothing but silence and the pressure on him as Newt crushes leaves and sorts through pill bottles. Credence must be relaxing a little bit on his magic now, because Newt refuses to believe no one noticed that sort of weight of power before. It’s a tightening pressure in the air as he focuses on Newt, like the sort of heavy feel one gets when there are hundreds of eyes watching them instead of just two.  
  
Newt’s paying closer attention to it now, and feels the moment it snaps off of him as he starts to turn around.  
  
“Is it alright if I check you over?” Ah, there’s a reaction. Credence visibly twitches in on himself, and his head jerks up a little. Not enough to look up, but just so he’s now looking at Newt’s feet instead of at his own. Newt takes a step closer, before he slowly sinks to one knee, putting himself at a level lower than Credence. “Nothing that will hurt, I promise. I would just like to make sure everything's in order with a few charms, then I have a potion here that will help you sleep. But I will need to touch you, is that alright?”  
  
Credence’s eyes dart around various points of the floor, and it’s several heartbeats before he answers “Yes.”  
  
“Oh good.” Newt sighs, relaxing a little. He’s happy to accommodate Credence in here, but he very much wants to get a good look over what he’s going to be housing with his creatures. Moving in slow, smooth movements, he rises up and approaches him. Actually, this isn’t too different from working with a new, nervous but intelligent creature. Credence is a human of course, but Newt automatically falls into a care routine that he’s done many times.  
  
“Could you look up, Credence?”  
  
After a few moments, which Newt waits patiently through, Credence looks up. And this time the weight behind those eyes slams into Newt like a locomotive. He has to admit, it does a slight bit of damage to his relaxed confidence. Gryphons or Sphinxes are one thing but he is simply not used to humans having a gaze like that. He feels like he’s back in his transfigurations class with Professor Dumbledore catching him at doodling imaginary creatures in his notes.

“Good.” He wheezes, then clears his throat and breaks contact with that dark eyed stare, focusing on looking at Credences jaw as he pulls his wand out. “Thank you, this should only take a jiffy.”  
  
Carefully, like he’s reaching for an injured hippogriff instead of a simple human (hardly simple), Newt rests his fingers over Credence’s pulse. It jumps notably under his fingertips, which Newt politely pretends not to notice. Despite his pounding heartbeat, the only outward reaction from Credence is a slight twitch of his eyelids and his jaw tightening.  
  
“Heart rate seems steady.” All things considered. Credence is looking down again, and Newt finds himself starting to go through the motions: check for dark magic (that lit up like an overpowered lumos, no surprise there), scan for broken bones, signs of shock, foreign magical energy (no light up there, interesting), magical trauma (there’s a light up, obviously).  
  
Credence is stone still the entire time, with the exception of a faint tremor that Newt feels in his fingertips still resting by the young man’s jaw. Usually the deep stiffness would lead Newt to suspect that Credence was repelled by touch, if he also didn’t feel the lean against his fingertips. Credence's entire body is tilted towards that one point, and he looks like he may go off balance as Newt pulls his hand away during the checks. Newt's hand is on his shoulder to prevent a fall without thinking, and he can feel Credence practically vibrating under his palm. He swallows and keeps his hand where it is, and actually finds himself glad that the Second Salem woman is gone for good. Newt is not the sort to wish violence or death on anyone, but there are exceptions.  
  
Besides that, everything is in perfect order. Body temperature feels fine, heart rate is strong, no signs of physical weakness at all. When Newt met the obscurial girl, she had been a wasted, ashen shadow. Cold and weak, slowly consumed inside out by her own warped magical energy. From what he had read, if they didn’t collapse dead first, physically turning into the obscurus was the final manifestation before the victim would fade away within hours.  
  
Credence, while obviously not entirely healthy, is physically fit, with a magical energy that Newt hasn’t felt in another human since he left school. It’s been a day and a half since he shifted back and forth between human and obscurus, and then was magically blasted. And here he sits whole and with no sign of the effects besides the trauma that caused this all in the first place.  
  
“Do you feel any sort of dizziness? Nausea? Tingling in your limbs? Ongoing numbness or weakness?”  
  
Credence’s eyebrows draw together, and he takes a moment before he softly says “No.”  
  
“Excellent.” Bizarre. Newt lights his wand and holds it up, “Could you tilt your head up? Thank you.”  
  
The pressure is less of an issue now that Newt is acclimating to it, and Credence stares up at him as Newt checks his eyes for any signs of neurological damage. “Could you keep your head still now, and follow the movements of my finger with your eyes? Very good, thank you. How old are you?”  
  
Credence’s eyes snap from Newt’s finger, to his eyes, then down to the floor before fixing somewhere around the third button of Newt’s shirt. Newt watches his jaw shift and clench tight, before he speaks. “Ma’ never said. She only noted the years since she saved us.”  
  
Newt has a few thoughts to say about ‘saved’ in this context, and he doesn’t miss the way Credence’s mouth gets a slight twist, the shadow of a snarl on the word. He keeps his thoughts to himself and leaves Credence to his. “How many years has that been?”  
  
“Twenty two”  
  
Over twenty. Credence looks it, certainly, but it’s different hearing it. Credence is over twice the age of any obscurial and, from a cursory inspection, seems to be suffering more from his treatment than anything the obscurus inside him is doing.  
  
It takes a few moments for him to notice that the pressure is focused hard on him again as he stares somewhere behind Credence’s shoulder and thinks. When he looks down the effect is...startling. Credence is staring up at him, black eyes hard with an intent focus, as if he wants to open up and inspect Newt’s mind. With enough training, he probably could have without breaking a sweat.  
  
“Do you know what’s wrong with me?” He asks, voice quiet and soft where his eyes are sharp.  
  
“It’s called an obscurus.” Newt says, stepping back quickly and flipping his wand back into it’s strap as he sets a pot of water boiling. “You were raised to be afraid of your own magic, and so subdued it subconsciously, likely when you were a very small child. That sort of force, not allowed to develop with you, turned in on itself and became….well.”No other way to put it. “It became an unstable mass of destructive dark magic.”  
  
Newt grimaces at himself, possibly not the best phrasing to have used with the obviously distressed obscurial sitting in front of him. Credence is unreadable, shoulders hunched in but watching Newt more openly now.  
  
“It feels like a shadow in me that went wrong.”     
  
“That’s a rather apt description, yes.”  
  
“Can you get it out?”  
  
Newt opens his mouth. Newt shuts his mouth and slowly exhales, then looks up to meet Credence’s eyes. “I don’t know if I can, Credence.” He admits quietly.  
  
Credence watches him, hands down at his sides gripping the stool with white knuckles and jaw clenched hard.  
  
“I am sorry.” Newt breathes, feeling a twist of pain deep in his chest. “I tried taking it out the girl, and she died shortly after anyway. I don’t know if my removing it may have actually...if it was faster because of that.”  
  
He’s gone back to looking at his decoction of leaves and roots for the sleeping draught, the weight of Credence’s eyes still on him.  
  
“Why are you helping me?”  
  
“I thought I already explained that.” Newt shrugs, straining out the plants and botting his potion.  
  
“I can’t be helped.” Credence grits, voice quivering. “It can’t be taken out of me, so I’m dangerous. I’m unstable and destructive and nothing can be done about it! So why?”  
  
“Because, you’re sitting in front of me, whole and human, talking to me. You hungry?”  
  
It’s hard, but doable, to hold back the smile at the dumbfounded look on Credence’s face. Not like there’s much progress to get done by just talking about helping when Newt is starved and Merlin knows when Credence last ate.  
  
“I can whip up a couple sandwiches.” He goes on, reaching into a couple baskets. “I don’t have much variety though.”  
  
Times like this is does envy the easy wordless magic Tina and Queenie showed in the kitchen. Newt never got the knack of it and never bothered for homier spells. It was easier to focus his energy on his protective and healers’ charms and mixtures and just slap together some bread and meat with a cup of tea.  
  
After the brief outburst, Credence is silent as Newt puts together the slapdash supper. There isn’t any staring at the floor now, now the weight follows Newt around the workroom with every move he makes.  
  
“Eat something before you drink that tea, I put a couple drops of a sleeping draught in there.” And he doesn’t much like the idea of trying to drag the unconscious Credence to a better place to sleep than the floor by the stool.  
  
Credence takes it with a barely whispered “Thank you” and stares at his plate, while Newt leans on the counter, and wonders again what in Merlin’s beard he’s gotten himself into.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Credence isn't given any actual age in canon so I'm just rolling with Ezra Miller's age of 24, so he was adopted (coughTAKENcough) at about two.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My favorite way to write post-NYC Credence is always quiet, outwardly submissive and meek, lowkey always 10000% ready to blow everything right up to heck.

Credence sits paralyzed on the stool, mindlessly chewing through a tasteless sandwich while failing to keep himself from staring at Mr. Scamander with his upper half down in what looked to be a lidded bin no deeper than four inches. There’s warm light, the smell of wind and hay and animals. All around him there are strange sounds that remind him of the stories of monsters waiting to snatch children from their beds. For months, Credence had dreamed of the magic world that was dangled in front of him, full of freedom and light. He discovered as much pain and darkness that had been in the old world, found himself in that dark, and yet…  
  
The inside of the suitcase reminds him of the folkish tales of old cottage witches living in their hovels. Everything is made from wood worn smooth, the rafters hidden in the clutter of hanging baskets and plants both mundane and bizarre. Walls are lost in a chaos of shelves full of bottles labeled with everything from “Basil” to “Acromantula AntiVenom”. A table is barely visible under the piles of feathers, pencils, notebooks, bowls and small cauldrons suspended over fires that flicker with no fuel and no harm to the wood beneath them. In the middle of it all is Scamander, now practically climbing into the shallow bin and muttering furiously.

“Where did that blasted thing get to?” Came the irritated voice, muffled and partially covered up by what sounded like a vigorous rummaging of things that thumped and clanged around with more noise than should come from such a small container. “You see something lying around constantly when you have no use for it and as soon as you need the damned thing it- ha!”

Scamander emerged, face alight with victory, holding a small, brick cube pinched between his thumb and forefinger.

There’s nothing about it that looks spectacular, and Credence has to wonder what all the fanfare for it is about. But Credence bites his teeth hard on the question, just as he did with every other that has been swallowed down. He can’t risk pushing, on the slight chance that Scamander will reconsider his offer and send him back.  
  
Credence plans on letting the ash fill and take him over if that happens. No hesitation, no giving in to anyone anymore.  
  
When Scamander leads them out with a quick jerk of his head, Credence follows with no hesitation. For now, the dark only simmers, drowned by curiosity as to what could be on the other side of the cabin door. Where was the light coming from? What were the strange sounds and where did the hints of a breeze come from as they worked their way through the open gaps of the walls? The suitcase lid sits above them like a trap door to a dark world above, and he wonders if they’ll step into another New York, or some other strange land or country.  
  
There’s another world. There are worlds. Worlds with creatures beyond explanation, beyond possibility. Worlds held like tarps strung along poles under a sky that faded into a distant shadow. Credence walks in a sunlit forest surrounded by worlds, and knows that somewhere, a small brown suitcase sits in the empty guts of the New Salem church.

 _'Witchcraft_ ’ hisses a voice in his head, and all he can think in response is that witchcraft is more beautiful than any wonder of the modern world.  
  
“What is this place?”  
  
He didn’t realize he had breathed the words aloud, that one question had slipped through him, until Scamander glances over his shoulder and looks around them with a wide smile.  
  
“My suitcase.” Was all he said, before stopping at a bare area of earth, occupied by colorful birds that Credence can’t identify. “Alright, clear out the lot of you, I mean it!” Newt commands briskly, and the birds jump and vanish with one pop after another.  
  
Credence twists to look for them, heart pounding with wonder, and then he’s arrested by an expanse of red desert right behind him. The only deserts Credence has experienced were in the words of the short novels he would sneak under his bed at night, or in the paintings hung on walls of official buildings showing the wonders of the wild west. They were flat things, streaked with saturated color that to Credence, looked like lifeless blurs that never matched what he had imagined in those stories.  
  
The dirt beneath his feet is black and rich, and strange twisting trees shade the two of them in cool air. All while a few steps away, desert sands blow in a hot wind and bake wavering lines into a vivid blue sky.

Before he can stop himself, before he can even think to hold himself in, his hand is reaching out. There’s moisture in the air he breathes, a soft breeze in his hair muffled by trees, but as he reaches towards the desert his hand hits a wall of hot, dry air like a furnace. Sand strikes his fingers on the wind, and he yanks it back when he hears a shuffle behind him.

“I’ve been holding onto this for a while now.” Scamander says, and he’s kneeling, clearing away a bit of leaf litter when Credence turns back around. “Had to pay good money for it too.”  
  
The cube is pushed into the ground like a seed. As soon as it’s buried, Scamander springs back, grabbing Credence’s arm to pull him along as, the earth explodes. Dirt is flung around, and Credence takes a moment to see what happens when it hits the desert and instantly changes into sand. The little cube unfolds, again and again, blooming like an industrial flower. Bricks spread like roots before sprouting solid walls that reach up, bend sharply and unfold into shingles. A spindly chimney is the last to twist up, and Credence’s legs feel weak when he looks at the completed building.  
  
It’s plain, plain and small. Just a brick house that looks as if it has no more than one room in it past the gray wooden door. But it grew like something alive, from a little cube held in Scamander’s palm.  
  
“Oh thank Merlin that actually worked.” Scamander sighs, leaving Credence’s arm warm when he let it go. “I admit the fellow I bought it from was not the most savory sort and this is an older model.  
  
“A house.” Credence manages.  
  
“A safehouse, to be specific. This is an Auror safe house for when they need some extra protection on the go. I had gotten for...for someone else who would have needed it. It’s designed to react to whoever steps in first and then prevent anything from getting in, or out, without that person’s say.”  
  
Cold ice flows down Credence’s spine. All the wonder and awe washes away in it’s wake, leaving a sharp, clear certainty and dread in it’s wake. Of course.  
  
He can see it clearly. Newt stepping in and grabbing Credence behind him, pulling him into the windowless brick and locking him in with his witchcraft. The house would close up around him black and impenetrable. Holding him, containing him, caged like a beast.  
  
Buzzing fills Credence’s head. His fingers tremble at his sides, and he resists the urge to crumple from the pain of it. Never again. Never again. He would not bow, he would not let himself be forced by anything. The dark calls to him, and Credence is ready to sink into it, to let go of the control he grasps it with. The only thing holding him back was a momentary hesitation at the idea of destroying the beauty around him.  
  
“Well, in you go.” Scamander’s voice clips in through the buzz, and the man only nods his head toward the door.  
  
Credence blinks, and the color is back in his vision. He stares at Scamander, who looks down and to the side, tilting his head towards the house again, waiting for Credence to go in. Scamander was letting him go first, giving him control of the strange, magic cabin.  
  
That, or it’s a trick, a lie that would trap him in no matter what he chose to do. Perhaps the vibrant worlds around him, awash in gold light and saturated color, are all a glamour.  
  
Hands balled into tight fists to stop the shaking, Credence walks past Scamander and steps in. As soon as his feet touch the floor inside, the small house shifts around him. Lights sprout from the wall hanging from iron that curls like vines, and walls split to open windows that light the single room inside.  
  
It’s a simple room. With wood floors, a table, a bed, empty shelves and cabinets above a sink and iron stove with a door to what Credence assumes is a wash room. It’s small, but larger than his and Modesty’s old rooms combined.  
  
“Very nice touch.” Scamander nods, peering his head in. “It isn’t anything fancy but-”  
  
The room blurs, and instead of cold or burning, it’s a warm swell that squeezes Credence’s lungs and has him breathing in sharp, shallow breaths.  
  
The tears are flashes on his skin, his heart threatening to burst from his ribs. “I don’t understand.” His voice wavers, and Scamander only looks at a point over by the stove in the corner.  
  
“It’s yours.” He says, like it’s as obvious and easy as that. “Only you can decide who can go in and out, and by design, dark magic can’t penetrate the walls of it.” His eyes slide over to Credence, who feels frozen by them. “I had the idea a while ago, and went looking for someone who had a spare safehouse like this. If you feel yourself slipping, you can go in here where nothing can get you, and you wouldn’t be able to hurt anything else. Wreck it all you want, it reforms to your needs.”  
  
Credence’s thoughts go back to the little girl Scamander had talked about, and the sorrow in his voice when he spoke then. It isn’t hard to guess who Scamander originally had in mind when he got this place. It wasn’t for Credence, but it’s being given to it now. A simple, plain, brick and wood room that is entirely in his control. A space that, if Scamander is telling the truth, Credence rules and decides on. Something that’s his.  
  
Scamander steps in, and pushes the cup of tea into Credence’s unresisting hand. The hand pressed to his is warm and calloused, and Credence is near tempted to grab at it to keep that touch from leaving. But then Scamander is slipping away, light eyes looking about the room as he talks.  
  
“Drink that up and rest well, I would imagine you need some sleep after the past few days.” He says brightly, already moving in his fluid way to the door. “The ship heads out tomorrow!”  
  
And he’s gone, flitting in and out of the room, leaving Credence standing and staring after him with a cup of sweet smelling, purple colored tea in his palm.  
  
  
\-----  
  
Credence stirs from sleep, and doesn't open his eyes.

He doesn't want to wake up. Not when there’s a chance that he’ll end up in a corner, looking at the empty, cold metal and wood of the New Salem house.

Or worse, his eyes will open to the sharply slanted ceiling of his room, with the sky looking in through the gaps and spaces of the tin roof, and Ma’...Mary Lou’s brisk step on the stairs.

He could almost hear it. The staccato ‘tap-tap-tap’ growing louder and louder as she steps with a sure, divine purpose on her way up to rap on his door and remind him not to give into sloth.

Rage and pain roil deep in him, scorching through his core and leaving raw ash behind it.  His chest tightens around his lungs until he’s sucking in hard, shallow breaths while he screws his eyes shut and holds on to the images from the night before. As long as he can keep his eyes closed, even as they burn behind his lids and his chest aches from holding back tears, he can relive the dream. He can keep out the threat of it all vanishing with the gray day out for a little longer.

The air crackles over his skin, raising goosebumps along his arms, something in the room cracks and shatters. This wasn't a dream then. The power that he felt whispering in response to his fear, reminding him that even if he did wake to the New Salem church over his head, he did not have to accept it quietly. He didn't have to accept anything quietly anymore.

The thought is like a balm. It isn’t calm that washes over Credence, it’s something else entirely. It’s still and sure, and when he opens his eyes, they’re a hazed white.  
  
The white and wood-beamed ceiling of the strange, magical cabin is over his head. Credence sees cracks traveling along it, healing up as soon as they appear until there’s nothing but flawless plaster and wood. When he sucks in a sharp breath, his lungs burn, and he hadn’t realized that he stopped breathing for a few moments. Now each inhale burns, and his vision blurs all over again.  
  
Real. It was real. All of it. He was leaving. Leaving New York, leaving the last remnants of Mary Lou. Leaving with a stranger who was something unfathomable and wildly strange.  
  
“Alright bugger off and wait your turn you bloody menaces! I only have two hands and you know it, wait your turn! Not like you won’t each get your share. Wallace that means you especially, don’t think I don’t see you sneaking up on me, I will not have a repeat of last Thursday.”  
  
Credence turns his head towards the sound of Scamander’s voice, frowning in confusion. Was he talking to some of the creatures? Curiosity spurns him, and when Credence slides from the bed he finds his clothes freshly washed and folded. He can’t imagine Scamander coming in for something like that, and wonders if it was something to do with the cabin.  
  
A touch to the sign that says “Wash” has the wall shifting, folding out into a sink and mirror that Credence stares numbly into. His movements are mechanical as he washes himself, combs his hair,  pulls his clothes on and puts every button and fold in perfect order. As soon as his tie is straight, the washroom folds back into the wall.  
  
_Witchcraft._  
  
It’s all surprisingly ordinary. No dark chanting or dancing naked around a bonfire in the woods. It’s a sink. A comb. A toothbrush. All appearing on command and putting themselves neatly away.  
  
When he steps out, Scamander is only a little ways away in a section of the woods that looks...darker somehow. It’s thicker and greener. That isn’t what has Credence freezing in the doorway.  
  
Scamander is surrounded by crabs. Dog sized crabs with shells that glimmer and flash jeweled colors in the dappled, leaf strained sunlight as they chitter and crowd around the unconcerned man scattering what looks like a bucket of ashes. When Credence can move again, he only gets a few feet towards them before Scamander’s hand flashes up, holding a soot-stained finger up in warning.  
  
“Oh, ah, careful.” He says, not looking up from the crowd around his knees. “Fiji’an fire crabs are generally harmless, but they can startle easily with new people and you...well you don’t really want to be on the behind end of them when they get startled.”  
  
Credence freezes, wondering where the behind end is. His question is answered when a creature turns, and lifts a turtle-like head to watch Credence with a dumb curiosity. “You...keep them?”  
  
“Oh yes, for now anyway.” Scamander dumps the rest of the bucket, and steps with nimble smoothness around the giant crabs towards Credence. He sets the bucket down and wipes his hand on his shirt, leaving streaks of black ash down his front. “They were hunted nearly to extinction for their shells on their native islands. People make them into cauldrons you see, though I can’t imagine why, it’s not like they’re any better than metal. People go mad for anything that glitters I suppose. I’m hoping to get the population stabilized and establish a protected area where they can live without worry. What’s fascinating is that people keep them as simple pets, but I’d never seen a small one grow larger than a rat. I think it’s something with the diet. Most people use fireplace ashes but I think pulverized volcano ash and rock is really what they need. Well, I don’t think anything. I know. My population is going to have to go on a diet soon with how much they’re growing.”  
  
Credence blinks, and Scamander looks up at him as if he just now remembered that there’s someone else there. He makes an odd face, like he can’t decide on how to smile or if he should. The result is a quick, strained tilt of the mouth somewhere between a smile and a grimace, before he’s moving on past Credence, who follows him to the wood cabin.  
  
“Hope you slept well.” Scamander says as he walks, grabbing a cloth and scrubbing his hands off, talking on without waiting for an answer. “We’re already on the ship and settled into the cabin, it isn’t big but well,” he gestures around the expansive worlds that surround them, glancing at Credence with another odd face, though this one is closer to an actual smile. “Are you hungry at all?”  
  
“I don’t know.” Credence answers truthfully, struggling to keep up with what’s going on around him. Scamander stops all his movements for a second to give him a sudden, piercing look, and Credence quickly looks down.  
  
“Well...we can see if we can get something up on deck.” When Credence chances a look up, Scamander is looking up and away from him, though he glances back with eyes lit up and a full grin.  
  
“Come on,” he urges, voice taking on a gentler, softer tone as he steps towards the ladder in his cabin. Credence can’t stop himself from moving towards him then, can’t stop himself from being drawn to that gentleness. “You’ll want to come up and see this, I think.”  
  
Go up. Back up out of the suitcase, into the real world. The dull, grey world. Credence stops.  
  
_No._  
  
The word is in his throat, filling his lungs, pushing against his teeth. He never wants to go back. Never wants to walk away from all this light and color and strangeness. He never wants to look at anything ordinary again.  
  
But Scamander is already clambering up the ladder, and Credence follows with his teeth grit together.  
  
The ship cabin is tiny and dark. Rust stained metal surrounds them at all sides with a dingy picture of a sunlit sea as the only sad attempt at decoration. A single, small, round window lets meager sunlight in, creating a circle of pitiful light on the narrow bed. A shudder of revulsion goes down Credence’s spine, and it feels like agony when Scamander snaps the suitcase shut.  
  
“Should still be able to see it.” He says, and is out the door with Credence in tow without warning or explanation.  
  
Ordinary people surround them in a tightly crowded hallway. Ordinary people who do not even see the ash streak still on Scamander’s front under the blue coat. People who only know their own lives and the crowd around them. People who have never seen a Fiji’an fire crab or now know that they, for some reason, do better when fed volcano ash. Credence wonders if anyone pressing around them has seen a desert.  
  
Credence stays as close to Scamander as he dares, a terror sitting low in his stomach at the idea of losing sight of Scamander. The man could vanish, could disappear in the crowd and leave Credence here in the ordinary. Every so often Scamander will glance behind him, and every glance is a temporary relief to the terror.  
  
The press is suddenly gone, and Credence’s breath stops in his chest.  
  
He grew up with buildings pushed up around him on all sides, the only times he has left the city it has been to travel around New England with trees and hills surrounding him.  
  
He’s never seen so much sky. Never seen the ocean spread not just before him in a harbour, but all around.  
  
New York City is a fogged line of buildings a ways away. They’re still close enough that Credence can see individual details like the squat wharf districts and the glimmering skyscrapers behind it. As if in a trance, he walks to the railing of the ship, hardly aware of Scamander silently following to stand next to him with his long arms braced on the metal poles.  
  
“Excuse me? Could I see your ticket sir?”  
  
Credence’s head whips from the sight of his city drifting away, and he stares at a frowning, tired looking man in a salt-stained uniform.  
  
“What?”  
  
The man’s frown deepens.  
  
“Don’t remember seeing you at boarding, you have your pass on you?”  
  
Panic grips him, and his knuckles are white on the rails of the ship. They’re caught. He’s caught. He can imagine Scamander’s voice clear like a sigh in his ear, saying ‘oh well it was worth a shot wasn’t it?’ and shrugging as Credence is dragged off. Dragged back to the grey city.  
  
His hand shakes, and his vision starts to turn grey around the edges. He won’t let them. He’ll be damned if they take him back there.

They’ll all be damned.  
  
A hand presses the crook of his elbow through the sleeve of his shirt, and Credence sees the flick of a wooden wand in front of his nose. A smoke-like wisp drifts from it into the man’s face. There’s a few moments pause, when Scamander’s fingers tighten briefly on Credence’s arm, and then the man’s eyes glaze over. He frowns at the two of them, blinking like someone who just woke.

“Right….right.  Now I remember. Sorry about that son, enjoy your trip.”  
  
Credence watches the man go, and then turns and looks back at the city, glad that the hand on his arm doesn’t move.  
  
New York City slowly drifts into the fog, and Credence keeps his eyes up and fixed on it. He doesn’t move, doesn’t step away from the hand holding his arm, until the last shadow of the Statue of Liberty is lost in the mist.  
  
“I’m not going back. Not back there. I never want to go back there.” He whispers, and the hand squeezes gently.  
  
“You don’t have to.” Scamander answers.


	4. Chapter 4

After two days on the ship to England, Newt is starting to think that things are going very well indeed.

At least, as well as could be expected in the circumstances.

They certainly could be much worse. Considering. It’s not as if he had too much of a plan going into it besides making sure another obscurial didn't die while Newt could do something about it. So really, he feels very comfortable thinking that it’s going well!

No one's been killed, at any rate. Or injured! And the ship is still sailing on peacefully! So in the grand scheme of his life, this is one of his smoother successes thus far.

Only two days in though, he reminds himself. Best not to get ahead of oneself.

Especially since things are technically going not- _badly_ , but Newt also hasn't been able to get more than a few words at a time out of Credence. This is an unexpected set-back. Newt isn't used to factoring in verbal communication as a social need  (not counting the aerial creatures who sometimes do best when their vocalizations are mimicked) and is struggling a smidge with filling the gap. He does see the necessity for it, of course, but Newt has never found himself bearing the brunt of initiating small talk. There’s a script in his head for that sort of thing, and discussing the weather is no use when Credence seems quite content to stay put in the suitcase.

Credence will answer questions politely and quietly if asked directly. Yes, the breakfast is fine. Yes, he slept well (this one was answered after a long pause). No, he doesn't need anything to drink. Interspersed with the answers are occasional, even quieter Thank You’s.

Credence doesn't say much, but he does watch. He watches every creature that moves by him with wide eyes, he watches the habitats as artificial weather systems drift from one to another.

He watches Newt. He watches Newt frequently, and with the intensive focus of something waiting for an attack.

Or, alternatively, something wondering if it should attack first.

Newt is used to those looks, and one would think that after receiving them from things like thunderbirds, griffins, and manticores, that a quiet human would be a breeze to ignore. But Newt isn't used to being watched like this by a human. And humans are, in his full 29 years of up close and personal experience, far less predictable than any other beast.

He hasn't taken Credence on a tour or through the daily tasks of caring for the creatures yet, figuring that it may be best to give the young man time to acclimate to what must be very striking and unsettling changes. But he did find his old book of A History of Magic and gave it to Credence, who had stared at it while murmuring one of his quiet thank you’s before tucking himself, small and curled, into a space on the ground against the stairs to Newt’s work shed with it cradled against his knees.

Newt hadn't thought to ask if Credence could read, but fortunately he seems to have no trouble instantly opening the book and starting from page one.

And, when he isn’t reading, Newt feels eyes on him from the space by the stairs every time Credence thinks he isn't paying attention. Newt can't bring himself to inform Credence that Newt could have his back fully towards him while wrestling an enraged fire drake, and he’d still be able to tell if Credence was watching him.

It’s a strange sort of truce between them, and Newt can't think of any other way to approach this than as if he was dealing with a trapped and abused animal. Newt has found in the past that applying animal behavior to human interactions is a successful way to handle things. People don't seem to like it when they're told that, but it does work nonetheless, and he can only hope it will work in this case.

So he gives Credence space, doesn't push for details or conversation, and makes sure not to pressure anything. He goes on pretending that he doesn't know his every move is being watched. He pretends he also isn't watching for any sign of Credence posing a danger to the other inhabitants of the suitcase. It really would be easier if he had any idea who Credence actually was besides a traumatized, insanely powerful obscurial who could be as quiet and still as a stone while staring like a basilisk. 

Though there are glimpses of who Credence is, beneath the wary fear and anger.   
  
Newt picks delicately at one of a pile of leaves in front of, carefully pulling the stems from them and setting the torn pieces into a wide basin on the table. The dugbog was recovering well from the hatchet wound, though it was still needing a regular salve applied to the gash in it’s bark-like back. Mandrake leaves, birch bark, and heavy black marsh mud seemed to be doing the trick.   
  
He’s so used to feeling Credence’s eyes on him, that he didn’t hear any footsteps approaching.   
  
“Is that magic?” Asks a soft voice, right bloody behind him.   
  
Newt nearly drops the broad mandrake leaf in his hands but recovers, though he nearly drops it again when he notices Credence just behind his shoulder, hands held stiff at his sides as he looks at the shallow basin in front of Newt.   
  
“A sort.” Newt answers, going back to tearing the leaf into small chunks as if his heart didn't just about try to bust from his ribs. “The dugbog I have needs to regrow the bark on it’s back after a nasty hatchet wound. The birch bark is a catalyst for new growth, it's often used for rebirth or renewal sort of spells, and mandrake leaves promote fertility which in this case also seems to work quite well for growth. The dugbog also eats the roots of the mandrake so I think it absorbs some nutrients from the leaves as well. The mud is from it’s own marsh and helps bind it all together. I came up with it when- Ah- I wouldn’t touch that.”   
  
Credence’s hand stops halfway to the potted mandrake plant, and yanks back hard, curled into a tight fist. He eyes Newt warily, which Newt tries to ignore as he goes back to his potion.   
  
“It’s no harm done. It’s just the mandrake root has quite the nasty scream when they’re pulled from the ground. Well, nasty may be an understatement, they can kill instantly when full grown like the ones I have here.”   
  
There’s enough of a quiet pause after that, with just the sound of Newt’s mortar grinding the leaves and mud together into a thick paste.   
  
“Mister Scamander?”   
  
“Oh, call me Newt, please!”   
  
There’s another long pause.   
  
“What’s a dugbog?”   
  
“Ah, that!” Newt nods over towards the marshy habitat. “See that log in the water over there? That’s the dugbog. They’re an amphibian deciduoid life form, similar to giant salamanders. They may be a cousin of the fire salamander, though water and plant based. Harmless overall, though they can get a little snippy about their territories and can leave some nasty bites on the ankles of unsuspecting waders. That fellow there startled a woodsman and got a hatchet in his back for it.”   
  
There’s no answer to that, though Newt is well used to no one answering when he talks about his creatures. People tend to haze out a bit halfway through explanations, though usually by that point Newt can’t stop himself from continuing.   
  
This time, there’s enough of a pause that Newt thinks Credence may have gone back to his usual spot by the work shed. Then there’s a sharp inhale from behind his shoulder, and when Newt looks up, he nearly gasps himself.   
  
Pickett had crawled out of whatever fold of Newt’s collar he was nestled in, and Credence had his head fully up, staring in wide-eyed, open wonder at the bowtruckle, who peers back Credence just as closely. Credence seems to have completely forgotten Newt in his fascination, and cautiously raises a hand with his fingers extended towards Pickett, who grabs onto the tip of his forefinger and inspects it.   
  
Credence holds completely still, watching the tiny root-like fingers wound around his fingertip. There’s even the hint of a smile, just slightly shadowing the corners of his mouth.   
  
“I see you’ve met Pickett.” Newt says quietly, and winces when Credence yanks his hand back like he was burned. And instantly, he’s back to being tense and drawn in, hands gripping each other as he ducks his head down and steps back.   
  
“I’m sorry, I-”   
  
“It’s alright.” Newt interrupts, reaching a muddied hand up for Pickett to step onto. “I’m trying to socialize him more, he has some attachment issues you see. I think he’s decided I’m his tree. Pickett is a bowtruckle. They usually attach themselves to a wandwood tree and are very peaceful unless their tree is threatened. He has a perfectly good tree that the other bowtruckles are perfectly happy with but he's gone practically codependent. I'm afraid I've absolutely spoiled him.”   
  
Credence is still locked up on himself, though he does raise his eyes to watch the bowtruckle eyeing him from Newt’s hand. Slowly, his hand comes back up, and Newt feels Picket’s feet roots grip onto his hands harder in response.   
  
This is good. It seems good. It should be good. This is progress! Credence was actually asking questions, showing some signs of coming from his shell, and it was in a way that Newt can work with since it's related to his creatures. This is good. This is very good.   
  
Pickett sways a little towards Credence, squinting at the young man. Newt’s only warning is the sudden hard grip on his hand before Pickett leans back sharply with a small squeal and scrambles up Newt’s sleeve. Credence’s hand yanks back again, eyes wide and jaw clenched hard.   
  
“Oh don’t worry about that.” Newt says quickly, feeling Picket settling somewhere on the back of his neck. “Pickett’s always been a bit-”   
  
“It’s alright, Mister Scamander.” Credence says in a quiet, hard voice, hand curling into a fist as he pulls it back against his chest. Before Newt can try and figure out what to say (something comforting? Explain the natural wariness of bowtruckles? They could be sensitive to dark magic?), Credence is drawing away and heading back to his usual spot by the stairs.   
  
Back to square one.   
  
And, of course, just when things seem to be going well…   
  
It’s that night, that Newt wakes to the sound of screams. Screams, he expected at some point, but not this sound. Not the sound of screams of rage, pain, and horror layered and multiplied on each other at once in a deafening roar.   
  
As soon as he hears it, Newt is flying from his bed, heart pounding. The creatures. _His creatures!_ Bugger it all what the hell was he thinking, bringing a massive, traumatized obscurial down here with his creatures?   
  
The night of his case is still, even the nocturnal sections dead silent, though Newt sees the gleams of eyes in the artificial moonlight, all staring towards the auror safe house.   
  
It’s shaking.   
  
Newt slowly approaches it, watching in a horrified fascination as walls crumble and rebuild themselves all at once, bowing and cracking and reforming in a constant loop while the shrieking fills the case.   
  
“Oh thank Merlin that thing actually works.” He breathes, fighting the urge to reach for his wand as he edges closer to the building. “Everyone stay back, just stay back.”   
  
Not like he needed to say anything, the creatures are apparently smarter than him and are keeping well away from the house that looks to be boiling. This is different from running down into a subway. There were only people around then. Now Newt feels the weight of all the creatures in his care, who gave him his trust, who he swore to protect. This isn't like bringing in some new predator or injured animals. Credence is a human.    
  
“Credence? Credence it’s alright, you’re safe.”   
  
The door under his palm is nearly scorching to the touch from the magic keeping it together, and it doesn’t budge when Newt pushes on it. _Bugger._   
  
“Credence. It’s just me, you’re alright. You’re safe here, I promise nothing will hurt you here.”   
  
The shrieking stops all at once, leaving a ringing in the air filled only by the scrape of bricks sliding back into place. Alright. Alright hopefully there isn’t an immediate danger now. This works.   
  
“Can I come in Credence? It’s alright if I can’t of course, it’s entirely up to you-”   
  
The door creaks, then swings open to his hand. Newt tenses, then breathes out a slow breath of relief when nothing rushes out. Instead, he steps in, keeping his hands up and visible.   
  
The entirety of the house is filled with black. Newt shuts the door behind him, and walks into the void-like darkness. There are ember glimmers like burning stars writhing through the black, and the air is filled with a scraping, crackling sound that reminds Newt of the rushing sound he heard at the beginning of an avalanche in the Himalayas.   
  
“It’s alright.” Newt says gently, walking further into the endless dark. There's nothing but the red gleams. No floor beneath his feet, no walls, no furniture, no ceiling. Nothing but the dark. “You’re alright Credence. Do you remember where you are? You’re in my case, in your room. We’re on a boat that is likely several hundred miles away from New York City.”   
  
The shadows rustle, and there’s a sighing sound as it pulls from the walls and floor. The room comes back into detail as the black seeps away from it, coalescing together into a solid form sitting on the edge of the bed.   
  
“I know where I am.” Credence says quietly, wisps of darkness settling around his shoulders and hair.   
  
“Oh. Good.” Newt lowers his hands, shoving them into the pockets of his pajamas. “Do you….do you mind if I step closer?”   
  
Credence shakes his head, so Newt closes the distance, settling stiffly on the bed next to him.   
  
“So ah. Well. Is everything alright?” Obviously not. People don’t go turning into screaming masses of unstable magic when they’re feeling chipper. People tend not to turn into masses of unstable magic in the first place. Was it still considered unstable, if it so easily reformed into a solid human form?   
  
Could Newt still consider the obscurus a separate “it” when it’s Credence shifting physically into it, instead of just unleashing the energy?   
  
“I shouldn’t have left.” Credence says quietly, staring at his hands. “I left Modesty behind. I don’t even know what happened to her.”   
  
“Modesty?”   
  
Credence jerks his head in a nod, and takes a shaking inhale. “She’s...she was my sister. Is my sister. Ma’...Mary Lou adopted her too, and she...she understood me. I understood her. I said I would always protect her, and I left her there.”   
  
Newt remembers a younger Barebone child, a small blonde girl with a rather unnerving stare. A very heavy, now familiar stare. Enough of a heavy stare that Newt had wondered if she was the obscurus when he recognized the marks on Shaw.   
  
If Ms. Barebone had ended up with one magical child, she may have landed two. And any child raised by that woman was in danger. A chill runs down Newt’s spine, and he wonders if he had been right about Modesty being an obscurial, but wrong about there being only one. Stupid. Stupid of him not to think of the other child! And of course Credence would worry!   
  
“I...may have an idea.” Newt says carefully. “How about I write to Tina, and pass on anything you can tell me about Modesty? Tina could find her, I'm sure.”   
  
Credence’s head jerks up, and Newt can’t for the life of him place the hard, dark stare fixed on him. Without anything to get a read on, he decides to just continue.   
  
“Tina is Miss Goldstein, do you remember her?”   
  
“The good witch.” Credence says quietly, and Newt feels a little offended that he apparently hasn’t earned such a title. Can’t say that Credence is wrong though. Tina is stubborn, hot tempered, determined, and a rare, deeply good person.   
  
“That would be her, yes.” Taking a chance, Newt reaches to pat Credence's hands, and isn’t too surprised when his fingers are quickly gripped hard. “I haven’t met anyone more determined and stubborn than Tina, if anyone could find Modesty, it’s her. And she’ll make sure Modesty is safe and looked after.”   
  
Credence tightens his grip on Newt’s hand, and looks up, inspecting Newt’s face with such focus that Newt has to drop his eyes to their hands.   
  
“Just her.” Credence says quietly, but his voice is steady. “I just want her around Modesty, not the other witches.”   
  
Well, can’t blame him for that. Not after the subway.   
  
“Well MACUSA only tolerates me at best, though they say they owe me. I can't say they would want to hear from me anytime soon. Tina’s the only one I would want to know. She can find her.”   
  
Credence searches Newt’s face, and just when Newt is wondering if he should find something else to say, Credence surges forward, hands fisted in the back of Newt’s shirt and head shoved hard against his shoulder, arms squeezing Newt’s chest.   
  
Alright. This is alright. This is something Newt can handle. Humans are creatures of touch, and he imagines Credence hasn’t had much positive contact in his life. This is something Newt can understand, though it’s a tad awkward.   
  
“Thank you.” Credence whispers, and Newt feels a tremor in the hands gripping his shirt like a lifeline.  He brings his own arms up loosely around Credence’s shoulders, making sure not to tighten them or seem too restraining.   
  
“That’s uh, it’s not a problem, really.” He says awkwardly, patting Credence’s back in what he really hopes is a soothing way.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOO BOY IM SORRY THAT TOOK SO LONG! Holidays happened, then me being sick happened, then this being a bit of a long transitionary chapter happened.
> 
> I'm planning on doing a bit more time skipping after this, since we took five chapter to cover a week of them awkwardly trying to figure each other out and no one wants to wait for chapter twenty for them to kiss. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's still gonna be a slow build up and burn for them, but yeah. We're gonna start speeding along their timeline a bit after this.

Credence was told that if you did something more than twice, it would become habit. If he recited his prayers every morning, it would become habit. If he praised God daily, praise would become habit. If he made a habit of praising God, then He would be more willing to help in times of need. Habit becomes ritual, over time.

Credence stopped praying a while ago, figuring that God wouldn't listen no matter how many mornings Credence tried speaking to him. There was no reason for Him to listen to those already damned and in Hell.

But Credence can still recognize the beginnings of a daily ritual forming.

He wakes up, and keeps his eyes shut. After two days the initial morning panic stopped, but Credence still keeps his eyes shut.  
  
He looks at the darkness behind his lids, and waits until he can feel the darkness in the rest of him. It’s a different sort of prayer. One that reminds him that he’s something else now, something twisted and wrong. But not something defenseless. Never defenseless.

Then, after he feels it seeping through his limbs, pulsing with every beat of his heart, he waits for a sound. Something to confirm that it’s all been real. Proof that he will still open his eyes to the single room of the strange, magic cottage down in a bright world.  
  
So far the first thing he hears has been Mister Scamander’s voice chiding some strange creature as if it were a mischievous dog. It’s only then, that Credence opens his eyes and starts the day.

The third day starts exactly the same, though now Credence still feels the memory of a heartbeat pressed to the side of his face. It follows him as he rolls out of bed with one hand to his cheek.  
  
He washes, combs his hair out of habit and pulls on the clothes that are always folded and clean on the small dresser. For the third time, there’s a small plate outside his door with a sandwich and cup of tea for breakfast.

For the third time, Credence drinks it down, wincing at the odd watery-bitter-leafy taste, but doesn't say anything. If he’s given tea he doesn’t want to be ungracious about it. There are worse things.

There’s no sign of Scamander anywhere, so Credence picks up his book of magical history and keeps out of the way, not sure what else he can or should do.  
  
Half the time, Scamander seems to forget that Credence is even there, breezing through his day from one set of tarped habitats to the next. Being ignored has, in the past, been preferable, and Credence settles easily into this dynamic. If Scamander isn't talking to him, it means Credence doesn't need to try to worry about saying the right thing back.

There isn't any risk of him asking about Modesty, or how Scamander plans to have her found. The more he’s buried in reading, the less he can worry about making himself a nuisance.  
  
But reading only makes him have more questions, and Scamander doesn’t fully ignore him or pay attention to him. There’s this in between, where Credence will find the man leaning over him, asking if he wants anything to eat, then looking momentarily lost when he has to then find something for them. Often, Scamander will vanish in a flurry up the ladder to the gray world above and come back down with something from the ship’s kitchens.

Credence will see him walk up a few feet away, fingers tapping against his thighs, and then suddenly turn around and walk off before either of them can say anything.

Mr. Scamander is unfathomable. His magic is unfathomable. Credence tries to learn, tries to understand this world, but the questions clog up his mind before he can figure out what to ask. He buries himself in the book of magical history, only to find himself more confused, wondering how this world has existed alongside the one he knew for so long.

Credence wants to know why so many of the hanging baskets apparently go on forever when Scamander reaches his arm into them. He wants to know more about the living, stick-like creature (the bowtruckle, Scamander called it) that peers at him over the top of Scamander’s collar. He wants to know what magic actually is.  
  
Ma...Mary Lou raised him on stories of magic. Magic was everywhere, and it was something dark and disturbing. There were images of women dancing naked around bonfires filled with the shadows of screaming demons, their flesh exposed to the world and shameless in their depravity. Wands were anointed in the blood of sacrificed Christian infants stolen from cradles. Women and men gave themselves to lust and power and the unnatural. Magic was the touch of the devil, and those who used it had given into the temptation planted in them.  
  
He knew it all for a lie the day he saw a witch wrench the belt from Mary Lou’s hands with the flick of a twig, then reach to touch him with an excruciating gentleness and tell him it would all be alright. It wouldn’t be, but he doesn’t think Miss Goldstein meant to lie then.  
  
The magic he reads about in the book he’s given is clinical and ordinary. It’s a string of words that Credence can’t parse out, that apparently he should know. Pages mention charms and jinxes for the every day, and what great wizard invented which spell. Once, Credence found a picture of witches tied to a pyre, with an amused note next to it about the common little charms used to rend flames harmless. He didn't  know if that made him want to laugh or sob himself sick, though he kept himself still as he stared at it. And what would Mary Lou have thought of that? Would Modesty have laughed that sharp, short laugh of hers?  
  
Then there was the magic Graves promised him. It was still dark, still forbidden and just out of his reach. But now it was power and freedom. Magic was a tool, a mystery kept behind a shut door that held every promise of deliverance from his hell. It was in the awful twist in his chest when Graves touched him and told him he was different, he was special. It dripped in every lie and false sliver of affection that Credence devoured like a starved mongrel.  
  
But Scamander’s magic is none of these things. It’s quiet and simple, nurturing and mind boggling. It’s the bizarre creatures and worlds held within a suitcase that Credence longs to explore so much that he feels himself trembling where he’s planted himself by the stairs. It’s a man with mud smeared to his elbows working some magical ointment on a creature that looks like a gigantic salamander made of waterlogged wood. It’s a warm, soothing light that Credence watches from his spot, feeling like he could never be a part of this world anymore than he could be in the powerful and respected realm Graves promised him.  
  
He wants to ask which is right, which is real magic and if he could ever learn any it.

But he doesn’t know what his limits are, or if he can ask anything. Or even, how to ask. Credence is new to asking questions, so he only watches Scamander and wonders.  
  
Why had Scamander followed him down into subway? When Credence had never met him before?  
  
Why had he stood between Credence and Mister Graves, and willingly let himself get attacked for it?  
  
Why did he go through so much to try and bring Credence away with him, when he seemed to forget Credence is there half the time?  
  
What would Modesty think, if she could see all of this? Would she be able to come with them if Miss Goldstein found her?

But he doesn't ask, and Scamander doesn't approach him. Doesn't touch him. It’s quiet and peaceful on the surface, but Credence feels a tension in every fiber of his body. He knows Scamander eyes him sometimes, like he’s just as uncertain as Credence is. It’s this careful wall built up, that Credence only watches and wonders at. He still doesn't try breaking it, not after he had ended up terrifying the bowtruckle last time. He already pushed too far once.

Credence thinks he’s figured out where he stands with Scamander. Or, more accurately, how he doesn't. They go on watching each other, equally unsure of what to do, and this is something he can start to understand.

Which makes things even more jarring, a week after he decided to leave New York, when he’s woken by sharp rapping on his door.

“Credence!” Scamander hisses, and Credence tenses with a frown, trying to figure out what could be wrong. His body is solid and human looking, the night sounds calm, yet there’s a sharp edge in Scamander’s voice.

Credence flinches at the second hard knock, and rolls out of the bed. When he pulls the door open, Scamander is standing there with his hand up, ready to knock again, and he blinks for a second before he brightens.  
  
Credence notes, somewhere in the back of his mind, that Scamander has the same striped pajamas that Credence found in a drawer in his room. He isn’t sure what that means, or why he notices that somehow under the low, thrumming worry starting to build in him.  
  
“Oh good! You’re awake. Come on.” Scamander says brightly, as if Credence only happened to be up at the same time someone pounded on his door.  
  
“You knocked.” Credence points out, then snaps his mouth shut when Scamander actually glances up at him.  
  
“I did yes.” Scamander says slowly, frowning like he isn’t sure why this is being brought up. “I wanted to see if you were awake.”  
  
Credence blinks, and Scamander is already looking away, head craned towards his own cottage as he shifts impatiently from one foot to another. Not knowing what else to do, Credence steps from the doorway, feeling strange and exposed with his bare feet on the soft, slightly moist ground. As soon as he moves, Scamander is grabbing his arm and dragging him to the cottage.  
  
“Is something wrong?” Credence asks, looking around the worlds around them. Everything is calm and quiet, but Scamander doesn’t slow down.  
  
“Wrong? Why would something be wrong?” The hand in the crook of Credence’s elbow is insistent and strong, and Credence is so distracted by it that he nearly bowls into Scamander when the man suddenly stops short.  
  
“Oh!” Scamander says, glancing behind Credence and clearing his throat. “Sorry. I didn’t think. That is- do you want to come along? I should have asked that first, shouldn’t I? It’s just I don’t know how long we’ll be near them and there aren’t any muggles out and about so now is the perfect time-”  
  
“I don’t mind.” Credence interrupts, not sure how long Scamander will go on. As soon as he says it he shuts his mouth and keeps it shut before anything else can get by. He wonders for only a moment if he should ask what it is that has Scamander so excited, but then the man flashes a wide, crooked grin and grabs his arm again.  
  
Credence is pulled in a sort of daze up out of the suitcase, even though the last place he ever wants to be is back in the ordinary world. The change from warm wood and earth to cold metal on his feet is jarring, and the smell of salt and stale air makes him shudder.  
  
But he doesn’t have much time to dwell before Scamander is tugging him along, pulling him up onto the main deck. Cold air hits him like a wall, sharp on his face. The ship deck is slick and bitterly cold with ice on his still bare feet. But the cold hardly registers when he sees the stars.  
  
Credence spent nearly his whole life in New York City, and he never even knew there were so many stars in the sky. Scamander’s hand on his arm is a blazing point of warmth, pulling him along while the air freezes his lungs, and Credence can only stare up at the sky.  
  
It’s dizzying. The night sky isn’t black at all. It’s awash with so many stars that it looks like diamond studded velvet. He’s seen ladies dresses that look like that, but on earth the look was garish and off putting. Here, he understands why people always say heaven is far above.

Scamander’s hand keeps pulling, and Credence follows it numbly to the bow of the ship, neck aching as he stares at the smears of light painted through the sky above them.  
  
“You see that anywhere, come on.” Scamander says impatiently, and Credence jolts when his hand hits the cold metal. It’s hard to tear his eyes from the sky, but then he sees the ocean spread around them, a dark mirror of the sky above with moonlight catching the uneven waves.

From the bow, the water spreads in all directions, and Credence’s hands grip painfully onto the freezing metal rails.  
  
Scamander’s hand presses between his shoulderblades now, and he’s leaning alarmingly far over the railing to point down. Credence stills, and has a feeling that the hand braced on his back is the only thing keeping Scamander from toppling over the ship.

“Keep an eye on the waves just on the port side.”  
  
Credence looks down, too aware of the lean form pressed against his side and the hand still on him to notice much at first. The moonlight catches on white seafoam curling away as the ship cuts through the water. Then there’s movement.

A large, wedge shaped head breaks the surface, flashing pale green before it ducks back down and is followed by a long serpentine body. It breaks out of the water a little ahead of the ship, spined fins catching the moonlight while it’s body undulates lazily behind it alongside the ship.

Credence forgets the cold, the fear and uncertainty that’s plagued him over the past few days. He cranes his head to try and see the length of the creature, but it’s body fades into the black water.

“Atlantic sea serpent.” Scamander explains, removing his hand to drape both his forearms on the railing beside Credence. “A juvenile by the looks of it, can't be more than twenty meters I’d say by the size of it’s head. Probably hoping to get some dolphins that show up to ride the ship’s waves. I wasn't able to see one on the way to America and was afraid I’d go a whole voyage again without a sighting. They’re very secretive creatures. Preferring to stay in the deeper waters during the day. I’ve seen evidence that they can control currents to help them swim vast distances, which could explain how they’re so spread throughout the world oceans. I even saw a couple in the Mediterranean, though they seemed to be smaller overall. I want to do a series of voyages at some point just to try and work out the morphological differences between regions. Especially tropical versus temperate waters.”

Credence leans against the rails, breath condensing as drifts of mist in the December night. The sea serpent cuts silently through the water, and Credence grips the rails until his palms hurt, just to have something reminding him that he’s awake. It’s almost disappointing when Scamander’s voice trails off, but Credence doesn't want to pester him for more information.

He’s aware, in a distant way, that Scamander is looking at him now instead of the water, but he can't take his eyes off the serpent. It swims calm and unworried about the ship, going unnoticed by anyone else.

“Does...does anyone else see it?” He finally asks, and even close to a whisper his voice sounds too loud. Scamander shrugs, fingers tapping on the rail as he looks back down at the water.

“Some might. Muggles are very good at pretending they don't see anything that doesn't fit in with what they know. Sea Serpents are just monsters from a less educated time, so obviously there can't be one swimming along with the ship.”

Muggles. Credence now knows from the book that Scamander means non magic people. The gray people from the gray world.

“I’d want to see it.” He decides, and stares hard down at the waves when Scamander’s head comes up to watch him again.

“Yes...I would to.” Scamander says slowly, and silence settles over them. The ship hums in the night, water splashing gently below them. Eventually the cold starts to set in, and Credence shifts on his achingly chilled feet. His fingers are numb on the railing, but he’s loathe to say anything now that he has this small proof that the world outside Scamander's suitcase isn't just ordinary and bland.

“Oh!” Scamander exclaims suddenly, and Credence starts, wincing as his cold limbs protest. “I nearly forgot, while we’re up here…”

He puts two fingers in his mouth to whistle sharply, and Credence is nearly disappointed when it’s an ordinary barn owl that flutters down from somewhere above them. Ordinary, except for the fact that they’re over halfway across the Atlantic.

“There we are. Just wait a moment there Thomas, thank you.” Scamander pulls a dead mouse from his pocket to toss to the owl. For a moment, Credence actually forgets about the sea serpent swimming below them. Did Scamander have that in his pocket the entire time? Did he just carry around dead mice? Was he sleeping with that?  
  
“Here, before I send this off, thought you’d like to read this.” Scamander says, pushing a folded piece of paper into Credence’s hands.  
  
“What is it?”  
  
“Letter to Tina - Miss Goldstein, I thought you would want to look over it before I sent it over to her.” Scamander shrugs, and looks away back to the water under Credence’s stare.  
  
There had been a part of him, that hadn’t really expected Scamander to follow through on his promise to write to Miss Goldstein about trying to find Modesty. They were far away from all that now, and Scamander wouldn’t have anything to gain from it, and even less reason to try to include Credence. Taking a deep breath, Credence takes his eyes from Scamander and opens the letter and squints at the scrawled writing in the dim light.  
  
~~_Miss G_ _  
_ _Por_ ~~ _  
_ _Tina,_ _  
_ _  
_ _How are you? You can’t answer that right now, so I suppose tell me how you are whenever you do write a response, not how you are now. Forget I asked that, actually. Though I would still like to know how things are when you write back, or in general._ _  
_ _  
_ _I’m nearly to England at the time of writing this, I think there’s just another day to go or so. Nothing exciting has happened, everything is normal. Nothing to report or I would definitely tell you._ _  
_ _  
_ _I know this seems a bit early to be writing you and all, but I had a thought. There was another Second Salemer child wasn’t there? It may be nothing of course, but I thought it may be something to look into. Or not. It’s just well, if there was one obscurial then there was definitely potential for another one isn’t there? If nothing else I would hate for all of that mess to leave another child on the streets, and you seem the person who could best find her._ _  
_ _  
_ _Not that I have much more information to give. I suppose that would be helpful. Maybe you remember more? Please keep me updated I would appreciate it._ _  
_ _  
_ _Dougal says hello. He doesn’t, really, but he may think it. Actually I don’t know if he does. He might. He has an excellent memory and does show an ability to grasp object permanence so he probably remembers you but I’m not sure if he would say hello but he did like you quite a lot._ _  
_ _  
_ _I think it’s best if I end this letter now, I hope things are going well._ _  
_ _Yours,_ _  
_ _  
_ _Newt_  
  
“Everything look alright?” Scamander asks as Credence reads the letter a third and then fourth time. Why wouldn’t it be alright? Was Credence supposed to approve or say something?  
  
“Does she not know about me?” He finally asks, and looks up when Scamander grimaces.  
  
“Ah, well, not yet no. She’s an Auror again, and I thought it may be awkward for her knowing that you were alive still. She wouldn’t hurt you of course! Not at all! But there was a possible conflict of interest that would have made things...well...complicated. I do plan to tell her when we’re in England.”  
  
Credence doesn’t understand, but he nods anyway, and knows Scamander is still expecting something. “It’s alright. Thank you, Mister Scamander.”  
  
“Call me Newt.” Scamander breezes, plucking the letter back and folding it up into a pouch on the owl’s leg. Credence sets his jaw, and doesn’t say anything to that.  
  
Scamander keeps requesting it, and it still feels wrong. Credence has never called anyone who wasn’t younger than him by their first name, and there’s something that feels too familiar and equal about it for him to be comfortable with.  
  
So he doesn’t say anything, and luckily, Scamander seems to have forgotten it already, giving the owl a scratch on the side of it’s head before it launches itself into the night.  
  
“There we are, if anyone can find your sister, it’s Tina.”  
  
Credence stares up into the night, trying not to shiver too obviously. He tucks his hands in his sleeves as he watches the sky long after the small owl disappears into the night. Frowning, he looks out over the water, which spreads for eternity.  
  
Finally, he can’t help but point out, “We’re over halfway across the Atlantic.”  
  
“Yes.” Scamander says brightly, “We should reach England sometime tomorrow, actually.”  
  
Credence frowns, still looking up at the sky, wondering if he should keep probing on this. As the pause goes on, he realizes that he’s going to have to ask, because Scamander doesn’t see what the problem could be.

  
“Can...can owls fly that far, Mr. Scamander?”  
  
“Newt.” Scamander replies, looking up with Credence now. “And normal owls, no, but Thomas there will be just fine, don’t you worry. He’ll just be a bit peckish when he lands is all.”  
  
It looked just like an ordinary owl to Credence. How many other ordinary things were secretly magic? How much has been hiding from him through his life? He shivers in the bitter air, watching the stars and the fog of his breath over his head.  
  
“Come on then, blast it’s cold isn't it? I hadn’t even noticed.” Scamander puts his hand back between Credence’s shoulder blades, and leads them back down to the suitcase. “I was thinking once we land, I’ll start showing you around and taking you through the tasks of caring for the creatures, how’s that sound?”  
  
“I think I’d like that, Mister Scamander.”  
  
“Newt.”  
  
Credence doesn’t say anything, but he’s smiling slightly as he steps back into the suitcase.  
  
\-----  
  
He wakes in the morning with his eyes shut, breathing slowly, feeling the darkness move in him. This time, he also thinks about a long creature cutting through the water, and Scamander leaning on his side telling him about the details of Atlantic sea serpents.  
  
When he hears something roaring in the distance, his eyes open and he’s smiling.  
  
There’s the same plate as usual outside the door, with a sausage, eggs, and a mug of tea waiting for him. Credence wonders if the food came from up on deck, since he still has never seen Scamander actually cook anything. Though this morning, the tea has enough sugar in it that Credence nearly chokes on it. Thankfully, Scamander is absent and Credence doesn’t need to explain his coughing fit as he tries to down the sickeningly sweet leafy brew. Wherever the sausage came from, it’s a relief after that, but Credence still feels slightly sick as all the sugar settles in his stomach.  
  
Scamander had mentioned something about celebrating when they landed in England, which must have something to do with the alarming amounts of sugar.  
  
As Credence steps further out, he stiffens back up, looking around with his jaw clenching. There’s no sign of Scamander, and the creatures are oddly quiet. Credence can feel eyes on him as he walks to Scamander’s cabin, and his skin crawls from the silent pressure of them, his hands balled into tight fists at his sides.  
  
“Mister Scamander?” He calls, though it’s more of a whisper. He clears his throat, fingers twisting together as he swallows and tries to force his voice into something louder.  
  
Then the hatch-like door slams open, and Credence jumps so hard he nearly runs into the table.  
  
“Credence? Oh, you are awake!” Scamander’s upper half pops down, hair hanging wildly down from his head. “We’re getting ready to disembark, I thought it may be best if you stay down below for now. Avoid any awkwardness.”  
  
There’s enough of a pause that Credence realizes that Scamander is waiting for a response.  
  
“Oh.”  
  
“If you like, I left my manuscript on the table there,” an arm works in awkwardly past Scamander’s head and gestures at the table to the left of Credence, “if you want to read it over and get familiar with everything before we start going through the care of the creatures here. Nothing too detailed, there’s a lot of stuff I have that isn’t even in there but it’s a start isn’t it?”  
  
Another expectant pause.  
  
Credence looks over at the tattered looking journal that Scamander must be talking about, pulling nervously at the sleeve of his shirt. “Yes.”  
  
“Now, don’t let anything give you any trouble. Dougal especially likes to see what he can get away with but don’t let him boss you around.”  
  
Credence wonders who Dougal is as he nods, teeth clenched together hard. Scamander, who is starting to look red in the face, beams brightly before disappearing back up with a snap of the suitcase lid.  
  
The silence that follows is nearly overwhelming. Usually the case is filled with sounds of the creatures or the different weather through the environments. There’s buzzes flying overhead and scurrying below in the ground and distant roars or grunts, along with the rushing of wind or soft patters of rain and distant thunder. Now, it’s silent, and Credence can feel the eyes on him as he sits stiffly at the table and opens the book.  
  
It shouldn’t be too much different, shouldn’t feel this different. Scamander hardly interacts with him as it is. But Credence feels his absence sharply. There isn’t the sound of the man bustling about and talking to his creatures, muttering spells and flicking his wand about while Credence watches in fascination.  
  
Now there’s nothing, just a wary, cautious silence. Credence stares at the pages of the book, focusing on it as he digs his thumbnail into the palm of his hand. In the silence, he only feels the roiling under his skin, and in the full daylight it feels less like an empowerment and more like a threat.  
  
His hand starts to shake, and Credence stares at the page, teeth grit together. He can’t lose control here. Not now. Not when things have been going well.  
  
He breathes slowly, forces each inhale and exhale to an even tempo, and he reads.

Credence couldn't say how long he stays there, but eventually he can ignore the cautious, heavy silence and loses himself in deciphering the looping scrawl of Scamander’s writing. Time seems to move normally in the suitcase, and the magic sun is at high noon when the hatch lid bangs open again.

Scamander only lowers a hand and waves it vaguely, so Credence closes the book and climbs up. Though he really wants to ask if he can just stay in the suitcase, as long as it isn't by himself.

When he climbs out, he has pause and take in the change. Last night, he stood on a freezing ship on the Atlantic, surrounded by dark water. Now, he’s in a compartment of a train car, climbing onto a seat across from Scamander as they blur past snow covered hills and bare trees.

“Sorry about the wait, I wanted to make sure we were well settled away from muggle eyes. The ship was alright but it’s good to be back on some proper transportation.” Scamander explains as Credence sits by the window.  
  
It hits him, just now, as he stares at the gently rolling landscape under a blue-grey sky, that he is very far from New York. Scamander has a mess of papers and pencils spread over his seat, spilling from his folded up legs where he’s hunched over a notebook resting on one of his knees. His hair falls mostly into his face, hiding his eyes, but Credence watches his mouth silently shaping the words he scribbles down.  
  
Scamander isn’t just different from what Credence expected of witches, he thinks. He’s different from anything Credence has known. The man is a quiet force of chaos, with his colorful clothes rumpled, feet folded under him on the leather seat without a care. Scamander, Credence is realizing, is entirely himself.  
  
Modesty would probably like him.  
  
Credence looks back to the window, letting his posture slump enough for him to rest his forehead on the cold glass. It’s an odd sort of rebellion, and he has a feeling it’s a bit lost on the man folded up and hunched over across from him.  
  
“Do you really think she may be like me?” He asks, then winces when Scamander jumps hard enough to knock some papers over. But he hasn’t been told to sit up, so he stays slumped as he is, just moving his head enough to watch Scamander blink at him.  
  
“What? Who? Who’s like you? Sorry.”  
  
“Modesty.”  
  
Scamander blinks at him again, looks out the window with a frown, then snaps his fingers. “Ah. The letter. You mean her being an obscurial?”  
  
Credence nods. Scamander shrugs.  
  
“I’m really not sure. It’s possible, it would be unusual for two to develop in one area, but your whole case is unusual.”  
  
“What are they usually like?”  
  
“Who?” Scamander asks, tapping his fingers nervously on the notebook, looking at the floor between them. Credence swallows, feeling the words stuck in his throat like lumps. He’s asking too much, but he can’t hold it back anymore.  
  
“The others like me.”  
  
Scamander looks up at him, and Credence freezes. It isn’t often, that Scamander has actually looked him full in the face, and Credence can feel the full careful, measured weight of the gaze taking him in. After a few moments, fingers tapping at his knee while his other hand fiddles with his pencil, Scamander twists his mouth and slowly breathes out.  
  
“Come on.” He says, instead of any explanation, popping open the latches of the suitcase. His papers are left on the seat, a few still on the floor. Credence makes out a few sketches of creatures with Scamander’s scrawling handwriting written around the edges, before Scamander’s hand pops out of the suitcase to wave him down.  
  
It doesn’t make sense, but Credence is already learning that nothing really does now. He isn’t sure if that’s the magic world, or just Scamander’s.  
  
He follows him down, climbing from the compartment on the train into the warmer, damp air of the forest Scamander keeps his workshop in.    
  
“I probably should have taken you here earlier, actually.” Scamander says, glancing only briefly to make sure Credence is behind him as he leads them through patches of forest with a variety of trees and suns over them. “It’s just that things got a bit carried away and well…”  
  
Scamander leads them through a gap in one of the tarps, into a glaringly white tundra, and Credence stops. Even with his feet up to the ankles in snow and wind howling around him, heat blazes through him, leaving him paralyzed.  
  
He doesn’t have to ask Scamander what the black mass lazily writhing inside the hovering bubble is. There’s a similar writhing deep inside him, constantly bubbling and churning away just under his skin and behind his eyes. It usually buzzes. Now, it’s screaming.  
  
Scamander has his hands in his pockets, standing to the side of the bubble and watching Credence calmly. He doesn’t move as Credence slowly walks closer to the bubble, hands shaking at his sides as he feels the same power trapped in there writhing inside of him.  
  
He looks at Scamander without a word.  
  
“After I tried to take the obscurus out of her, I kept it here.” Scamander explains, eyes sliding over to watch the black cloud. “I wanted to study it, to try and learn as much as I could so I could better help any other obscurials I might find.” His mouth twists in a not-smile. “Unfortunately, your cases ended up being quite different from anything I’ve been able to find.”  
  
“You just kept her here.” Credence stares into the bubble, stopping just a foot away from where it hovers at chest height. It looks so small as it drifts in its confines with only flashes of power sparking through it. He raises his eyes to  Scamander, who’s mildly frowning at him with his head tilted.  
  
“Her? Oh. Oh no, Credence you...you misunderstand.” Scamander’s throat works, as if words are building up and being swallowed back down. “This isn’t...all this is is the obscurus. It was a completely separate thing.”  
  
It doesn’t feel separate. The thing in front of him drifts and moves with an apparent life of it’s own, and Credence feels the same sort of dark with every beat of his heart. When he lifts his hand, he sees Scamander tense, but not stop him when he holds his palm just over the bubble. The obscurus inside flashes sharply, writhing a little faster.  
  
“What was she like?”  
  
Scamander looks down, hands twisting and working in front of him. “She...was frightened. Mostly. Very frightened. I wasn’t able to get too much information out of her, really. Her magic had manifested when she was very young, and she was locked away early. By the time I found her she...she didn’t even remember her name. But she agreed to come with me when I asked.”  
  
Credence closes the hand held up to the bubble and pulls it back to him, skin crawling tight. Scamander keeps talking, not looking up.  
  
“It shouldn’t have ended up that way for her. Sudan is part of the Wizarding Confederation, and in most of the more populated areas follow the same laws. But she was from a small village, very isolated. Most...most communities like that I’ve found through the world are very open about magic. Magic users are often seen as a valuable part of the community, you see. They develop within their families, often using magic in ways that are so far from what we consider the most basic rules of how it all works. But this...I had a feeling there had been some outside influence at some point. Some muggle missionaries or something of that sort. In either case, when she developed, it was seen as a threat.”  
  
Scamander takes a slow breath, and Credence is silent, waiting for him to go on. “Obscurials, is the name for the human that hosts the obscurus. The magic that is repressed turns in on itself, lashing out when the host is unaware, sometimes in reaction to emotional distress. At the same time, it feeds on the life of the host, the child. By the time I brought here down here she was...she could hardly move on her own. I thought it was from the conditions she was kept in, but it was all internal as well. Taking the thing out of her was a last resort, and she...she died within a few hours.”  
  
Scamander’s voice stumbles over the last sentence, and Credence stares as the man dashes his hand over his eyes quickly.  
  
“Most obscurials don’t live longer than ten, she couldn’t have been more than seven or eight. And they’re usually wasted away, eaten away by their own magic. And I never heard of one that lived after physically turning into an obscurus.”  
  
Credence looks down at his own hands, whole and steady despite the scars covering them in hash marks and stripes.  
  
“When….when I was little, I was very ill.” He says softly, and sees Scamander’s head lift from the corner of his eyes. “I felt like I was being burned, and all I could think was that I didn’t want to die.”  
  
He had thought it was hellfire, burning him from the inside, and the idea of giving into it had kept him up sobbing in delirious terror through the nights.  
  
“But I was supposed to die.” He goes on, looking up at Scamander. “Wasn’t I?”  
  
“No one is supposed to die or be alive. No one is _supposed_ to do anything.” Is Scamander’s immediate response, brows furrowed. “They just do, or they don’t. You didn’t die.”  
  
Credence clenches his fist where it rests against his other hand. He’s spent his entire life worrying about what he was and was not supposed to do, supposed to be. He was supposed to be a good son, supposed to be grateful for the second chance being given him, supposed to spread the truth about darkness and witches. To think that there isn’t anything, no path set before him, no destiny, no rules to live by, is…  
  
He swallows, trying to fathom the idea of it. It’s like standing at the edge of something, and feeling both the terror and thrill at the urge to jump and see what happens.  
  
“Do you want to stay here with it?” Scamander asks, and Credence looks back up at the trapped obscurus.  
  
Was that going to be his fate? Was that why he was here? He was a mystery to solve, a specimen. Perhaps that was what Scamander wanted, to study him, to add Credence to the pages of notes filling the journals scattered through the workroom.  
  
It should enrage him, looking at the trapped thing that could be him. It should, but the dark continues as just a dull beating with his heart. He could be a specimen, he thinks. So far, being a specimen has been a better life for him than being a person has.  
  
“No.” He answers, and Scamander bursts into movement, nodding sharply and leading them back out.  
  
“We’ll head back up then! Hopefully we haven’t missed the trolley, I could go for a few cauldron cakes after that voyage.”  
  
Credence follows him out, only pausing to glance once at the dark thing behind them.


End file.
